Finding Mrs. Wright Page 14

  “Please.” Cassandra sucked her teeth. “I told you I ain’t scared of her.”

  “I know, but I don’t want you to see how I act when she gets here. It won’t be pretty.”

  “Really?” Cassandra raised her eyebrows. “Well, I need to see the good, bad, and the ugly, right?”

  I let out a deep breath. “I guess so.” God was gonna have to help me not to kill Shauntae when I finally did get in touch with her.

  “Sit down and be still, Devon. You’re wearing a hole in the floor.” Cassandra pulled me down into the chair next to the bed. I had been pacing since we got in the room.

  “How could she be so crazy? What was she thinking? How do you leave your child alone in the house in that neighborhood?” I fired question after question about Shauntae’s trifling behind until I got tired.

  Cassandra just sat there and listened. Finally she asked, “I hear you talking, but what you gonna do about it?”

  I looked down at Brianna, balled up in the bed with the arm board securing the IV sticking out from under the covers. “I’m gonna have to get custody of my daughter. No matter what it costs and no matter how long it takes. I gotta do what I gotta do.”

  “Good.” She put a hand on my knee and just let it sit there. Somehow, it made me a little calmer.

  “Thanks for driving me tonight.”

  “You don’t have to thank me all the time. But you’re welcome.”

  “You don’t have to stay.”

  “I know. I want to.” She flashed me that pretty smile and it didn’t make sense that I could feel any bit of happiness with Brianna lying there in the hospital bed again.

  I thought about our conversation in the kitchen earlier. I wasn’t sure what “giving it a chance” was but I was down for whatever she wanted to try. Maybe I’d get all wide open like Chuckie and be talking about marriage in a year or two.

  “What are you doing here?” Shauntae stood in the doorway with her hands on her hips, glaring at Cassandra. We both stood up.

  “Shauntae, where have you been? I’ve been calling you for hours.”

  “I’m here, ain’t I? I got your little note you left.” She gave Cassandra that nasty look. “I see your little girlfriend is with you again.”

  I wanted to put my fist through her head. “You go off and leave Brianna by herself and she ends up in the hospital again and all you can worry about is Cassandra? Are you that crazy?”

  “I’m just saying, you telling me she ain’t your girlfriend, but every time I turn around, she all up in your face.” She rolled her eyes at Cassandra. “And in Brianna’s face.”

  “That’s more than I can say for you,” I said. “How could you leave her in the house alone?”

  Cassandra picked up her purse. “Time for me to leave, Devon. Do I need to take you to get your car?”

  I unclenched my fists and turned away from Shauntae for a minute to face Cassandra. “No, I’ll spend the night and then my parents will be here in the morning.” I let out a deep breath to calm down. “Let me walk you to the elevator.”

  “Yeah, walk your little girlfriend to the elevator.”

  I walked up close to Shauntae and whispered loud enough for only her to hear. “Cassandra is the least of your concerns right now. You better hope I don’t snap your neck for putting our daughter in danger.”

  Shauntae must have felt the heat coming from me. She had to feel my body trembling with anger. I actually scared myself because I really did feel like I could kill her at that moment. She sucked in her lower lip and stood there looking simple. I turned back to Cassandra. “Let me walk you out.”

  She quietly grabbed her bag and proceeded out the hospital room door. I followed her. I jabbed the button to call the elevator. My hands were still shaking. I wondered how they would feel around Shauntae’s neck. I remembered watching my dad kill a chicken on my grandfather’s farm when I was little. I wondered if Shauntae would die that easily.

  “Devon?”

  I shook myself out of my murderous thoughts. “Huh?”

  “Try to stay calm, okay?” Cassandra said.

  “Yeah,” I said distractedly. Had Cassandra heard me threaten to snap Shauntae’s neck?

  “I’m serious, playa. There’s one rule I won’t break in dealing with you.” She gave me a smirk. “I don’t date men in prison.”

  I stared at her for a second, and then had to laugh. “Always got jokes, huh?”

  “You know you like it.”

  The elevator chimed to let us know it had arrived at our floor. Cassandra slipped her arms around my neck and softly kissed my cheek. “For real. Don’t let her get to you. Stick to the plan. Full custody of Brianna. Don’t argue with her. Just do it.”

  I nodded. “Yeah. You’re right. Doesn’t make sense to argue with a fool.”

  “I didn’t say all that but . . .” Cassandra stepped into the elevator. “See you tomorrow, Devon. If you guys are still here, I’ll come by after art class.” She waved at me as the doors were closing. I waved back, thinking that at some point in my life, I must have done something right.

  I felt a little calmer when I walked back into the room until Shauntae said, “I know what you thinking, but don’t even try it. I’m still not giving you custody of Brianna.”

  “Shauntae, do you know you can go to jail for leaving Brianna in the house alone?”

  Her eyes flew open. “Why you tell them that? You trying to get me put in jail so you can take my daughter?”

  “I didn’t tell them anything, but there will be a social worker assigned to Brianna’s case since she came back to the hospital so soon after being released. Once they start asking questions, it’s gonna come out.”

  Shauntae looked all panicked. “You ain’t got to tell them.”

  “You think I’m gonna lie for you? And even if I don’t tell the truth, you think Brianna won’t? She’s a child. Children tell it like it is.”

  Shauntae dropped into the chair by Brianna’s bed. “I didn’t mean to . . . I didn’t think she would . . .”

  “Yeah, what exactly were you thinking, Shauntae?” For the first time since she had arrived, I noticed the way she was dressed. The long jacket she had on fell open when she sat down. Clearly, she had left Brianna to go to some dude’s house and didn’t bother to put on a top to cover the lace teddy she was wearing. She had used the showing up half naked tactic when she was trapping me. “Oh, I see what you were thinking. I hope it was worth it.”

  She pulled her jacket closed around her and frowned. I could tell she wanted to say something nasty but the possibility of going to jail had taken the fight out of her.

  I painted the picture for her. “Yeah, I’m sure DFCS will be getting involved, too. Now I gotta have them people all up in my business because of you. You know they come out and inspect your house? Ask you a whole bunch of question and get all up in your life?”

  I knew Shauntae knew all about that because her girl Sherece had lost both of her kids to the system. I was shocked to see a tear roll down Shauntae’s cheek. I hadn’t ever seen her cry before. I didn’t think there was anything she cared about enough to make her cry. Certainly not Brianna.

  I decided to take it easier on her. But I still needed to know. “What happened, Shauntae?” I tried to keep my voice gentle. “When I left, it seemed like you were really going to try to do things right with Brianna.”

  She wiped away that one tear and started fidgeting with her hands. “You were right. It was too hard.” She swallowed and a couple more tears fell down her cheeks. I passed her the box of tissues on the table beside Brianna’s bed. “She wouldn’t let me stick her finger. I tried, but she closed her eyes and started yelling really loud.”

  “She wasn’t yelling. She was singing. That’s how she handles being stuck. I wrote that on the paper.”

  Shauntae dropped her head. Clearly, she hadn’t read through my notes. “So then I decided to give her some insulin but I couldn’t figure out how to draw it up in the syringe and
I didn’t know how much to give. So I called Sherece, since she works in a hospital.”

  I frowned. “Sherece is a nurse?”

  Shauntae shook her head. “She takes the patients to their tests and stuff, but still, you know, she’s around the patients and doctors all day.”

  My jaw dropped. I clamped my mouth shut to keep from telling her how stupid she was.

  “But neither one of us could figure it out. So Sherece gave Brianna some of her weight loss pills she’s been taking. They’re herbs and they’re supposed to cut your sugar down so you don’t get fat. So I figured . . .”

  Shauntae stopped talking when she saw the look on my face. I clenched my teeth and counted to ten. The more she talked, the more sure I was about my decision to get full custody.

  “And then Brianna got upset that me and Sherece were eating pizza while she eating all that boring food your mama cooked her. So . . .”

  “So?” I knew what was coming.

  “So, I felt bad. And I didn’t think it would be so bad if she ate a little bit.” Shauntae looked at Brianna sleeping in the hospital bed and new tears rolled down her face. “And then she started asking for other stuff and I just thought . . . And Sherece said if we gave her a couple more of the herbal pills, she’d probably be okay.”

  “Get to the part where you decided it was okay to leave her in the house alone.”

  Shauntae bit her lip. “Well, after that, she said that she was feeling tired, so I told her to go take her bath and go to bed. And . . . well, she went to lie down and I thought she was ’sleep. I didn’t go that far.”

  “Didn’t go that far?” Was she serious? “Out the front door is too far away from a six-year-old.”

  “But she was ’sleep. And I didn’t know she was gonna get up and finish all that food. I didn’t give her that much, Devon. I only let her taste a little. The rest she did after I left the house.” She said it like that was supposed to make it okay.

  “And why would you turn your phone off? Brianna tried to reach you, then I called you for an hour straight.”

  “I was . . .” Shauntae put her hands over her eyes. “I was busy.”

  I stood and walked to the window. I remembered Cassandra’s words and calmed myself down. No sense arguing with a fool. “You can’t possibly think I’ll ever let Brianna stay at your house again.”

  “It was only this one time.”

  “Only this one time? She could have died. Not only is the diabetes dangerous, but what if someone had come to the house and you weren’t there? You know where you live, Shauntae. And it’s not like the police would show up anytime soon if Brianna called 911.”

  Shauntae bent over in the chair and held her head in her hands. “How I’m supposed to live without . . .”

  I turned from the window and looked at her. “Without what?”

  She started crying for real. “I’m already two months behind on my rent, Devon. I can’t . . .”

  I felt disgust bubbling up in me. “Is that all Brianna is to you? A child support check? Do you even love your daughter?”

  Shauntae sat up and looked at me. The only way I could describe her face was confused. I shook my head. She didn’t even know what love was.

  “I don’t know what you’re going to do about your rent, Shauntae. In fact, that’s not my problem anymore. The only thing I care about is Brianna being healthy and happy. Do what you gotta do.” I sat down on the edge of Brianna’s bed. “If you want to still see her, we can make arrangements for you to come visit with her at my parents’ house. Or I’ll even bring her over to your apartment for a few hours. But I won’t ever leave her alone with you again.”

  Shauntae snarled, “You can’t just take her like that. There’s a legal document filed that says you have to pay child support. It says we have joint custody.”

  “Fine, we can go to court for me to get full custody as soon as you get out of jail for leaving her in the house alone. By then, DFCS will have made a recommendation that you’re an unfit mother.” I didn’t actually know whether she would go to jail for leaving Brianna, but I knew she didn’t know either and was dumb enough to believe me. “If that’s the way you want to do it . . .”

  “I don’t want to go to jail.”

  I shrugged.

  Shauntae stood up and slowly buttoned her jacket all the way to the bottom. She picked up her bag and started walking toward the door.

  “Let me know if you want to see Brianna.”

  She kept walking without saying anything.

  “Shauntae.”

  “I’ll call you.” Shauntae left without even looking at Brianna.

  I wondered if she would make any effort to see her, now that her child support check had been cut off.

  Fifteen

  When the doctors came by the next morning, I was very honest with them about what happened that landed Brianna back in the hospital so soon. I showed them the records of her finger sticks while she was at the house with me, and told them about all the cookbooks and magazines and everything I could possibly tell them to convince them that Brianna would be safe in my care. I went so far as to explain the custody issues with Shauntae and assured them that she would never be allowed to go to her house alone again.

  I must have been convincing because they agreed to discharge Brianna with the promise that I’d bring her back for a follow-up appointment on Monday. Me and Brianna were all too happy to be leaving the hospital so quickly. I called my parents to come get us since my car was still at my house since Chuckie had picked me up the night before.

  Brianna was all bubbly when we were leaving the hospital. When we got into the back of my parents’ car, though, a worried look crossed her face.

  “What’s wrong, Bree?” I asked her.

  She strapped herself into her booster seat. “Daddy, do I have to go back to Mama’s house?”

  I pulled the booster seat strap to make sure it was well locked, then fastened my own seat belt. “No, Brianna. We’re going home.” I wasn’t sure how to tell her she was never going back there again. Not to stay anyway.

  She was quiet for a few seconds and then said, “Sorry I ate all that stuff I wasn’t supposed to eat. Mama and Miss Sherece said the pills they gave me would make the sugar go away, so I thought it was okay. Please don’t be mad at me, Daddy.”

  “I’m not mad, Brianna. But you have to promise Daddy that you won’t ever do anything like that again. There’s no pill to make the sugar go away. If there was, Daddy would have bought you a whole car full.”

  “And Poppy would have bought you a whole truck full.” Pop looked at Brianna in the rearview mirror. “You know that don’t you, Sweet Pea?”

  “I know, Poppy. And Gammy too.”

  Brianna leaned back against her booster seat, staring out the window for a few minutes. I knew it wouldn’t be long before she let me know what was on her mind. Sure enough, she piped up a few seconds later. “Daddy, I don’t think Mama knows anything about diabetes. And she wouldn’t stick my finger to find out what the magic number was.”

  “I know, baby girl. We talked about it when she came to the hospital.”

  Brianna’s eyes grew big. “She was there? Mama came to the hospital?”

  Pop frowned. I didn’t tell them about Brianna being in the house alone when I talked to them on the phone last night.

  “She came by when you were sleeping. We didn’t want to wake you up and she had to leave.”

  “But why did she leave when I’m supposed to be staying with her right now? How come she didn’t stay at the hospital instead of you?”

  It took me a few seconds to come up with what I thought was a decent answer. “I was upset about what happened, so I told her I would stay and that you would be going home with me.”

  My dad kept looking at me in the rearview mirror and my mother turned around in her seat. Just as she was about to open her mouth to ask me what was going on, I shot her a look that said, “I’ll tell you later.”

  After a
few minutes of quiet, Brianna asked. “Do you think Mama doesn’t want me anymore since I have diabetes?”

  I patted her on the leg. “Of course not, Brianna. I just think it was hard for her.”

  “Daddy, do I have to go back to Mama’s?”

  “Bree, I told you we were going home.” I tried to keep the irritation out of my voice, but on only about an hour’s sleep, I was tired and my nerves were on edge. I couldn’t handle her twenty questions right now.

  “I don’t mean today. I mean forever and ever.” A tear spilled down Brianna’s cheek. “I don’t want to go back there, Daddy. Please, can I stay with you all the time?”

  I wiped the tear from her cheek. I wanted to take her out of the booster seat and hold her in my arms real tight. I was instantly sorry for being impatient with her. I couldn’t imagine how scary it must have been for her to be alone in Shauntae’s apartment sick. “You don’t have to go back, Bree. You can stay with Daddy.”

  Her eyes lit up. “You promise?”

  I nodded. “I promise.”

  I thought Pop was gonna wreck the car looking at the two of us in his rearview mirror. Mom finally said, “What your Daddy means, Pumpkin, is that we’re all gonna work on making sure you don’t have to go back to your mom’s house.” She gave me that mother glare of hers that said, “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

  Brianna looked from Mom to me with confusion on her face.

  “No, what Daddy means is that you don’t have to go to your mama’s house anymore,” I said.

  “What?” Brianna, Pops, and Mom said it all together.

  “Me and your mother had a long talk about it last night and we decided that with what’s going on with you and the diabetes, it would be best if you stayed with me all the time.”

  Brianna’s face broke into a grin. It was matched by grins on both my parents’ faces. I added quickly, “Not because she doesn’t want you anymore. But because we both want you to be healthy and safe.”

  Brianna leaned over in her car seat and threw her arms around me. “I love you, Daddy.”